On Thu, Dec 20, 2001 at 02:09:56PM -0000, Ivor Williams wrote:
> Hi there,
>
> Just curious, what does perl actually stand for, or is it not an acronym?
>
> I have come across an anecdotal reference to "Pathologically Eclectic
> Rubbish Lister", but this sounds like a miss quote from Red Dwarf, as in:
>
> Rimmer:- Don't give me that pathologically eclectic rubbish, Lister!
On Thu, Dec 20, 2001 at 02:19:28PM +0000, Sam Smith wrote:
> On Thu, 20 Dec 2001, Ivor Williams wrote:
> > Just curious, what does perl actually stand for, or is it not an acronym?
>
> `man perl` says
>
> PERL(1) User Contributed Perl Documentation PERL(1)
>
> NAME
> perl - Practical Extraction and Report Language
and at the bottom of that man page:
Perl actually stands for Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish
Lister, but don't tell anyone I said that.
NOTES
The Perl motto is "There's more than one way to do it."
Divining how many more is left as an exercise to the
reader.
The three principal virtues of a programmer are Laziness,
Impatience, and Hubris. See the Camel Book for why.
perl v5.7.2 2001-12-06 PERL(1)
Nicholas Clark
